France 24
The Center Pompidou will be closed from the end of 2023 for more than three years of major works
The Center Pompidou, one of the most important museums of modern and contemporary art in the world and one of the most original architectural places in Paris, will close at the end of 2023 to reopen in early 2027 after a major facelift, and full of “new proposals”. The big facelift of the Center Pompidou is coming soon. The Minister of Culture Roselyne Bachelot announced to Le Figaro, Monday January 25, that the famous Parisian museum of modern and contemporary arts would close a little more than three years for large-scale work. “There were two options on the table , one consisting in restoring the Center while keeping it open, the other being the complete closure “, explained the Minister. “I chose the second, because it turned out to be shorter in time and a little cheaper”. Such work had never been undertaken in the Center Pompidou, inaugurated in 1977 in the heart of Paris. Their cost is estimated at around 200 million euros, the museum said. They will start at the end of 2023, end at the end of 2026 and the center will reopen at the beginning of 2027 for its fiftieth anniversary. “It is not easy to announce a closure during a period when we are closed,” the president admitted to AFP. of the Center, Serge Lasvignes, assuring that “the principle was that there would be no dismissal [pour les quelque 1 000 employés]”.” Dangerous to give the feeling that the center is aging “At the end of discussions initiated since 2011, the Ministry of Culture approved last Friday the master plan for the works of the giant building made of tubes and steel, unique in its kind. They will be done in three years rather than seven, which would have been the case with the partial closure option: asbestos removal, renovation in order to meet safety standards, technical standards, fire protection etc. energy savings, as well as accessibility for the disabled. “The total closure option certainly allows us to spend a little less than the partial closure option and it includes total asbestos removal,” said Serge Lasvignes. ” I thought, he explained, what a center perpetually under construction could represent for staff and visitors, and also for its image in a context where brand new buildings are opening up like the Bourse de Commerce ” very close. “It is a crucial issue”, a- he argues, stressing that “it is very dangerous, in a very competitive period at the Parisian and world levels, to give the feeling that the center is aging, that it dates from another era”. Already the caterpillar which houses the escalators along the building is being renovated. A project which should be completed in the summer of 2026. Serge Lasvignes, who is coming to the end of his mandate in mid-2021, hoped that “a brand new center, new proposals, will lead to an increase in attendance” , while the closure will have reduced certain costs. We will “have to find the financing”, he admits: “We do not have the means from our own resources, so that means that they will have to be loans from the ‘State and it will be necessary to find forms of patronage, to call on special resources. The image of a new Pompidou Center may interest large companies “.” Pompidou touch “The Library (BPI), the first public reading room in Paris, will have temporary premises, between 7,000 and 10,000 m² in intramural Paris. “The demand” that “the government asks us” for the mobilization of collections throughout the territory will mean that we will not be unemployed “, assured the president of Beaubourg. Support for the Center Pompidou-Metz will be stepped up. The Ile-de-France conservation and creation center in Massy will open from December 2025, with an exhibition space and multiple activities spanning 2,500 m². The President of the Center will also offer turnkey exhibitions everywhere and strengthen his presence at internationally, in addition to the already existing centers in Shanghai, Malaga and Brussels. “I hope there will be one or two more”, he noted without saying more. Serge Lasvignes believes that the right strategy is to assert even more the “Pompidou touch”: multidisciplinary and commitment in major social debates – equality, the fight against discrimination, global warming … With AFP
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